CARLSBAD, Calif.—Life Technologies Corp. has
announced its entrance
into a master development agreement with Bristol-Myers
Squibb Co. for current and future companion diagnostics projects. This deal marks
the second
collaboration between the two companies and represents what Life
Technologies calls "another step in [the company's] strategy to develop its
diagnostic business through internal development, partnerships and select
acquisitions"

The
agreement reportedly covers an initial project
for oncology and provides for a long-term partnership across a potentially
broad range of Life
Technologies instrument platforms and a wide range of
therapeutic areas.

"The pharmaceutical
industry is increasingly
turning its focus to discovering and delivering targeted, personalized
medications," said Ronnie Andrews, president of
medical sciences at Life
Technologies. "As more and more targeted drugs come onto the market in the
next decade, there will be a growing need for
diagnostics that can help predict
which patients will benefit from which drugs.

Life Technologies
possesses a breadth of platforms
that can be leveraged in the development of new diagnostics. These platforms
span both genetic and proteomic analysis,
including next-generation sequencing,
Sanger sequencing, qPCR, flow cytometry and immuno-histochemistry. In addition,
the company recently announced
that its Ion Torrent Personal Genome Machine
(PGM) would be developed for proteomics capabilities.

"For oncology alone, hundreds of agents are
currently in clinical trials, and we see strong market opportunity in the
robust expansion this
will mean for the companion diagnostics space," said
Andrews. "Life is uniquely
positioned to provide pharma a flexible, cost effective means
to manage the
evolution of the companion diagnostic assay through the drug development
process."